


Of Komodo Dragons & Late Night Takeout

by Head_Of_Ianus



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond (Movies)
Genre: Bathing/Washing, Bathtubs, Domestic, Eve Moneypenny is a Good Friend, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Hair Washing, Platonic Female/Male Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:41:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25151818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Head_Of_Ianus/pseuds/Head_Of_Ianus
Summary: Eve Moneypenny's and James Bond's friendship was based on a series of somewhat strange rituals that included a fair share of banter, stupid souvenirs from tourist shops across the world, going behind M‘s back on an often monthly basis and dubious amounts of after-mission takeout. Frankly, Eve thinks to herself, they have done weirder things for each other than washing some hair and listening to Komodo Dragon rants.
Relationships: James Bond & Eve Moneypenny
Comments: 8
Kudos: 14





	Of Komodo Dragons & Late Night Takeout

**Author's Note:**

> For the 007 Fest 2020 Fluff Prompt Table, squares "Komodo Dragon" and "Water" :)

Eve Moneypenny's and James Bond's friendship was based on a series of somewhat strange rituals that included a fair share of banter, stupid souvenirs from tourist shops across the world, going behind M‘s back on an often monthly basis and dubious amounts of after-mission takeout.

So it wasn‘t all too unusual for Eve to show up at James' flat at 2 o‘clock in the middle of the night after a particularly strenuous mission, shitty greasy takeout pizza in a bag dangling by her side (there was a time and place for nicer things, and it wasn‘t now).

Kicking off her trainers after shutting the door, Eve announced her presence by calling out for her friend, only to have the man mutter back half a greeting and something about having a bath, muffled by the bathroom door. He also might have sounded as though he was close to falling asleep, and Eve softly shook her head in disbelief:

“You know, you are going to drown one day, falling asleep in the bathtub.“

“That's not how that works-“

Of course, it wasn‘t “how that worked“ and Eve knew that very well, but James rattled on for a while about the why, and Eve kept humming in agreement, just happy for now to keep him awake long enough to get some food into him before he passed out. She let his voice fade to background noise in her ears as she took out plates from the orderly kitchen cabinet to place the pizza on. Quite a few things had changed about James' flat now that he‘d been back for a while. The picture frames and the art pieces were finally on a wall instead of the floor, there were open books stacked up on the couch table. After filling two glasses with water and leaving them with the pizza on the kitchen table, she ventured over to the bathroom and swung open the door — and grimaced at a wave of penetrating aroma rolling over her.

“Don‘t you think you could have gone a bit more lightly on the lavender oil?“

The shock of blond hair sticking out from the absolutely obscene amount of foam that covered the rest of the bathtub wobbled slightly as James shot her a murderous glance over his shoulder:

“You weren‘t the one who had to wrestle a bloody Komodo dragon for the second time this year, so I think I am quite entitled to soothe my sore muscles any way I please.“

“Are you starting to miss being thrown into tanks of piranhas?“

James merely groaned in dismay and slid down further in his tomb of a bubble bath, until finally the only thing of him still left uncovered by white puff was his head. Chuckling, Eve sat down onto the wide frame surrounding the bathtub and settled down leaning against the wall next to her friend's head. She decided to take pity on him and let him vent a bit, sulky as the other man looked:

“Did you fall into its enclosure again or were you thrown into it this time?“

“The target tossed my Walther into the enclosure, so I had to go and get it.“

Somewhat mindlessly, Eve stroked her perfectly soft fingers through James‘ wet hair. Gathering some water in her other hand, she poured it slowly over his — admittedly pretty dirty — head. Well, apparently he really wasn‘t lying about being dragged through the dirt:

“Q was saying something about the gun looking strangely chewed up. Didn‘t expect him to mean that quite that literally — Would you hand me the shampoo bottle?“

Not even bothering to ask for what, James handed over the bottle and made an undignified sound at the mental image of Q trying to figure out what he had done to his Walther this time.

“Eve, just imagine: I was in that enclosure, trying to figure out where the bloody animal is and whether it has my gun, and it's just straight-up sitting in front of me and staring at me as though I am the weirdest thing it has ever seen in his life — they actually look quite friendly when they do that — and ...“

Eve let out a small laugh and shifted to sit cross-legged behind him to continue her new-found occupation. Trying to figure out what she was doing, James let his head drop back to lay on the frame and stared at his friend, who had opened the bottle of shampoo to put a few drops of it in the palm of her hands and spread them. It took Eve a moment to notice him observing her, but she eventually beckoned him to continue his story with a small gesture and gently pushed his head back upright.

“I think it smelt the blood from the few cuts I got, and suddenly it was tackling me. That's basically an entire person jumping onto you.“

“Quite a scaly person, in that case.“

“A reptilian, so to say.“

James chuckled at his own line, but as Eve started massaging the shampoo into his scalp, sighed slightly and leaned into the touch. The lines of his face softened a bit as he relaxed, and then — he let out a gigantic yawn, mouth open and eyes pressed shut. If James Bond had any real grace in the first place, he clearly wasn‘t using it now. To her content, Eve was sensing a slowness settle into James' movements, and as she kept massaging anyway, she started to carry more and more of the weight of his skull, and his eyelids started to droop. Minute after minute passed as Eve kept working through his hair and eventually, the shampoo foam covered James‘ entire hair like a crown. He looked positively ridiculous, and some part of her wanted to take a picture. Eve gently lowered his sleeping head onto the frame of the bathtub, and briefly pondered James' personal hygiene-related communications of trust.

But eventually, the water would get cold, and Eve would rather wake him up before that. Gently pushing a last strand of hair from his forehead, she muttered his name, and — as expected — James twitched and blinked his eyes open. For a second, they wildly flailed around, but once they focused on Eve, the tension melted back out of him.

“I fell asleep -“

“Hmh, you did. Would you hand me the showerhead? I still need to rinse out the shampoo.“

James complied and let her wash out the shampoo until Eve decided that she had done her work sufficiently well, and turned off the water. Sitting in the cooling water and now somewhat more present, James smiled at his friend somewhat lop-sided:

“I really owe you something again, huh?“

“What's new about that, James? But of course, you can always repay me with dinner invitations. And massages. And I also heard a rumor you were going to Greece in a few weeks, and I really need olive oil -“

“Understood, Ma‘am.“

Eve let out a startled laugh and lightly cuffed him over the head before sliding off the bathtub.

“Get out of the water before it gets cold, I‘m going to wait in the kitchen. You still need to tell me the tale of how you escaped the fearsome reptilian.“


End file.
